Healthcare professionals' perceived challenges and solutions when providing rehabilitation to persons living with dementia — a scoping review

Abstract

Aim This review aimed to map studies related to healthcare professionals’ perceptions and attitudes towards rehabilitation to persons living with dementia and extract what they perceive are the barriers and solutions.

Background Rehabilitation can improve the quality of life and integration of persons living with dementia into society. However, there are several barriers accessing rehabilitation services. Healthcare professionals are a source of information to understand the challenges and provide solutions to improve these services.

Design Arksey and O’ Malley (2005) five-step framework for scoping reviews was used. The PAGER framework was used to identify research and practice recommendations.

Method Seven databases including Medline Complete, Academic Search Ultimate, Ageline, CINAHL, PsycInfo, Pubmed and Google Scholar were searched. The healthcare professionals’ perceived challenges and solutions were categorised using Braun & Clarke (2006) thematic analysis.

Results Fifteen articles were selected for review. The challenges and solutions were organised according to their association with three stakeholders; the persons living with dementia/informal caregivers, healthcare professionals and the organisation providing the service. A number of challenges and solutions were identified. Nine of the studies focused on persons living with dementia following a fall or a hip fracture. Most of the studies focused on the perceptions of allied health care professionals, with nurses working in rehabilitation settings being underrepresented.

Conclusion Healthcare professionals have to consider the complexity of rehabilitating persons living with dementia irrespective of the rehabilitation speciality. Moreover, more studies are needed that focus on the views of rehabilitation nurses.

Relevance to clinical practice This review provides further evidence of the healthcare professionals’ misconceptions about the rehabilitation potential of persons living with dementia. There is a need to educate healthcare professionals about the societal, attitudinal and environmental barriers faced by persons living with dementia and their caregivers.